Dec 12, 12 at 1:04pmRabidChinaGirl

Steam Community Market enters beta, lets community buy and sell with real money

Today, Valve begins testing the new Steam Community Market, by using the now free-to-play shooter Team Fortress 2 as a platform for beta testing. What's all this, exactly?

The Community Market, in Valve's own words, is intended to "expand the Steam Economy beyond trading," namely by allowing players to buy and sell in-game items with others using Steam Wallet. So basically they're letting the community build their own economy, with real money and everything.

The trading system is already a major success on its own, and Valve counts that over half a million trades are carried out each week. Says Valve's Tony Paloma:

"Extending game economies beyond trades and giving players a way to turn gameplay into funds for new items and games is a key component for moving that success forward."

The Community Market will be extended to other Steam games following this holiday season. Bear in mind there's quite a bit of fine print to take in, like items being subject to transaction fees. An extensive FAQ on the official site covers some of these points.

Valve certainly hasn't slowed down with the new features. Just over a week ago, Big Picture officially launched on Steam.

Thread Recap (last 10 posts from newest to oldest)

Dec 13, 12 at 9:52am

Blue Neon

Meh, I have a strong dislike for most of the f2p, MMOs that are pay-to-buy-no-subscription are fine though - I have had TF2 since The Orange Box released. Ever since it went f2p it just hasn't been the same as it used to.

Dec 13, 12 at 7:09am

S-I-E

ah, finally a useful way to get rid of all those crates.i'll just put them out of the inventory and straight onto the market for a cent or two and let that place do the rest.

who cares if i just got 5 cents per year for it.

Dec 12, 12 at 4:56pm

BlackLabel

quote GLaDOS

I'm not exactly sure what Team Fortress 2 has evolved into at this point.Not complaining, though.

I really think at this point Team Fortress is a vehicle for Valve's social experiments. They introduced hats to observe how obsessive certain players got about having them all. They introduced loot drops while allowing players to buy items and keys to unlock chests, to see if players truly would. Now they are seeing if players will actually buy something another player found in a game with real money. Granted they could have just observed Diablo 3 for this one, but I guess it's easier to observe the raw sales figures when it's happening in your game.

Dec 12, 12 at 3:55pm

Lorx

Site says $1.72 now, must've updated. I think thats actually higher than people where buying them for on paypal before they started this.

And an addition to your comment on 'rarity', the hats you see going for real money are normally of Unusual quality, which can have prices ranging from $10 to $200+ based on hat and effect, and Buds, which are currently hovering around $32 each.

So yeah, vanity. Nothing to worry about unless somebody here is like, an investor of hats and assorted hat related goods.

Dec 12, 12 at 3:49pm

Megamaster37

Site says $1.72 now, must've updated. I think thats actually higher than people where buying them for on paypal before they started this.

And an addition to your comment on 'rarity', the hats you see going for real money are normally of Unusual quality, which can have prices ranging from $10 to $200+ based on hat and effect, and Buds, which are currently hovering around $32 each.

Dec 12, 12 at 3:33pm

Lorx

iirc the setup was (is?):

Vintage rarity is old, not available in shops or drops

Genuine rarity is stuff from events/game release freebies

Shop has every item in the game, but only at "normal" rarity

Any other rarity is drop/crate only

Rarity having nothing to do with power, just straight up vanity. So, pretty much whatever.

Dec 12, 12 at 3:27pm

hbn

Bit mixed about this, especially since it could lead to the best items being available only for those who pay for them.

Doesn't the shop already have every item anyway, you just can't pick out different "rarities" (vintage or whatever)? I don't play TF2 enough to know if that's wholly true or not.

Well TBH I haven't played TF2 for awhile anyway so I'm not quite sure if anything has changed since then.

Dec 12, 12 at 3:26pm

Lorx

quote harbin

Bit mixed about this, especially since it could lead to the best items being available only for those who pay for them.

Doesn't the shop already have every item anyway, you just can't pick out different "rarities" (vintage or whatever)? I don't play TF2 enough to know if that's wholly true or not.

Dec 12, 12 at 3:15pm

hbn

Bit mixed about this, especially since it could lead to the best items being available only for those who pay for them.

Granted it would probably be Valve trying to combat bots that sell items anyway, so they have more control over how stuff works so I suppose it would also be to control the economy and enforce more protection from players getting ripped off, although I'm sure Valve will also take a small commission since quite a lot of companies do when they operate things like this.

Dec 12, 12 at 3:12pm

Lorx

Perhaps I'm just thinking wishfully, but I'd like to think it's more because they saw the opportunity with players trying to use the system for it, and wanted to implement an actual system for those players. Players > Profit motivation, rather than the other way around.